This paper responds to the call for more focus on how micro-level processes of identity regulation are shaped by, and constitutive of, wider societal institutions. We provide a case study of identity regulation in a Chinese multinational and show how senior managers in the firm draw on distinctive national and organizational contexts in China to construct, reinforce and reproduce a particular set of identities for employees. These identities draw upon discourses in the wider Chinese context which reflect the struggle of China to become a major industrial power after a century of humiliation by the West and the need for employees to provide this extra effort in the face of the existential challenges faced by the company and by the country. We demonstrate how managers create specific HR mechanisms that intertwine these discourses with the identities of employees and with the identity of the organization. This paper contributes to a better understanding of how micro-processes of identity work and mid-level processes of identity regulation and firm strategy are linked to macro-level institutional structures. Based on the framework provided, the paper discusses how far similar identity regulation mechanisms could be adopted elsewhere where similar macro-level discourses might be available, first in other Chinese MNCs, second, in other East Asian countries such as South Korea, third, more widely in emergent economies where MNCs are embedded in state-driven forms of capitalism, and finally in developed economies where populist nationalism is becoming increasingly influential. In this way, studies of identity regulation can bring organization studies into greater dialogue with other social sciences concerned with wider institutional change and continuity

From Germany's chipmaker Infineon's proposed takeover of US-based Wolfspeed being blocked in 2017 to China's Huawei being banned in the USA and other countries in 2020; from the UK's new National Security and Investment Bill being announced in the Queen's Speech on 19 December 2019, to the EU's FDI Screening Regulation fully entering into force on 11 October 2020, inward foreign direct investments are increasingly scrutinized by host-country governments on the grounds of national security concerns. While FDI policy and screening regimes work differently in different countries, they share something in common, that is, ambiguity and obscurity have become the key features of FDI policies for most countries when concerned with national security. Drawing on securitization and balance-of-power theories, I contend that the ambiguity in FDI policy is intentionally constructed to leave room for power struggles. I argue that ambiguity is an important prerequisite for politicians and other political and corporate actors to engage in the securitization of FDI to support their political and commercial agendas. This commentary contributes to a better understanding of the prevailing trend of ambiguity in relation to inward FDI policy, a reality that is different from what Cuervo-Cazurra (2018) advocates.https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/jibp

No abstract